


The Chivalry of Highgarden

by LadyRhiyana



Series: The tale of Squire!Brienne [4]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Courtly Love, F/M, Highgarden, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-09
Updated: 2019-02-09
Packaged: 2019-10-25 05:52:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17719349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRhiyana/pseuds/LadyRhiyana
Summary: Higharden is a pleasure palace built of honey-gold sandstone and twined with night-blooming roses. It is a place of masques and courtly love, where gallant knights and courtiers dress in silk and velvet and play at wooing beautiful maidens with flowers, songs and extravagant promises.**After leaving Crakehall behind, Ser Jaime and his trusty squire Brienne travel into the Reach.





	1. The Chivalry of Highgarden

**Author's Note:**

> In ASOS, Margaery describes Highgarden as "...there are groves and fountains, shady courtyards, marble colonnades. My father always keeps singers at court...We have the best horses, and pleasure boats to sail along the Mander."

**PART ONE (Brienne)**

The Reach is golden and lazy in the warm sun, fields of wheat and lavender and heady golden roses, far as the eye can see, rippling in the afternoon breeze. They’re travelling slowly, in no particular hurry to reach their destination; Brienne can feel the warmth of the sun seeping into her blood and slowly thawing the chill deep within her. 

It was so easy, she thinks. No more than a slashing cut she had practiced a thousand times before. Ser Jaime and her other sparring partners would have blocked it with ease, but – 

The man had _screamed_ as she sliced open his belly. 

She hadn’t expected the stink of it. None of the songs ever mentioned the piteous cries of the wounded, or the lingering smell of blood and shit.

**

 _The first kill is the hardest,_ Ser Jaime says. _The one you always remember. But it gets easier, as time passes._

**

They pass through tiny farming villages and larger market towns, where townsfolk dressed in their best attire mix with farmers and merchants calling out their wares, their barrows piled high with melons and peaches and fireplums, with bolts of cloth, leather goods, household items and all the riches and abundance of the Reach. The sound of the blacksmith’s forge mixes with the gay chatter of the townsfolk and the music of strolling singers, and the heady fumes of sweet summer wine are intoxicating in the warm heat. 

Ser Jaime sheds his woolen surcoat and his red cloak. His golden hair curls in the heat, and he starts going clean-shaven again. Brienne strips down to shirt and breeches as well, and hacks her hair short with a knife. 

Inevitably, they draw stares and whispered comments: Ser Jaime, golden, tanned and beautiful, and Brienne ugly and awkward and ungainly. Brienne has mostly learned to ignore them. Sometimes, even though he is not wearing his golden armour or his white cloak, she hears someone hiss _“Kingslayer!”_ behind Ser Jaime’s back. 

He pretends not to hear them. 

When they don’t feel like sleeping in an inn, they make camp near cool streams and under spreading green trees. They take turns bathing: Brienne grows accustomed to the sight of Ser Jaime in only his breeches, water trailing down his golden chest and back. 

As the sun sinks down towards the horizon, they sit on the green banks of the stream, their bare feet dangling in the water, and listen to the droning of the cicadas. 

Sometimes Brienne dreams, and when she wakes, her heart pounding and the taste of blood on her tongue, Ser Jaime does his best to distract her. Lying back on their bedrolls, looking up at the great expanse of the night sky dotted with brilliant stars, he tells her stories of Lann the Clever and his cunning wiles, or tales of the Kingsguard drawn from the pages of the White Book. In turn, Brienne tells him legends of the Stormlands and the great deeds of Galladon of Morne.

And so they pass their days. 

** 

**PART TWO (Jaime)**

Gilded pleasure craft topped with gaily coloured canopies ply their slow way up and down the Mander, the inhabitants reclining on silken cushions and dining on fresh grapes and peaches, drunk on sweet summer wine and the warmth of the golden twilight. Paper lanterns float on the water like stars. The air is filled with the harmonies of lute and harp and viol, with happy laughter and bantering conversation. 

Jaime remembers the court’s last visit to Highgarden, when he and Cersei had shared a fabulously ornate boat topped with crimson and gold silk and traded hidden caresses beneath the shadowed canopy. They’d been drunk on wine and music and their own daring. 

“It’s like something out of a dream,” Brienne says, breaking into his reverie. Her eyes are bright with girlish wonder, her smile wide and unshadowed. In that moment she is as young and innocent as any maid, Jaime thinks, in love with songs of romance and chivalry. 

Highgarden is a place out of fantasy. Unlike Casterly Rock, which does not pretend to be anything other than a fortress, or even the Red Keep, with its blood-soaked history and intrigue, Higharden is a pleasure palace built of honey-gold sandstone and twined with night-blooming roses. It is a place of masques and courtly love, where gallant knights and courtiers dress in silk and velvet and play at wooing beautiful maidens with flowers, songs and extravagant promises. 

The violence and death of the forest at Crakehall has no place here. 

**

They dine with the court on their arrival. Trestle tables covered with embroidered linen cloths and scattered with roses are set out in the famed gardens; wax candles and scattered lanterns cast intimate pools of light and shadow and add to the atmosphere of luxurious elegance. The air smells of night-blooming flowers, and somewhere out of sight, hidden musicians play sweet, melting melodies. 

Jaime is dressed in crimson silk. The ladies of Highgarden are dressed in bright, daring gowns meant to drift with ethereal grace over slender white limbs; Brienne is dressed in a blue tunic and breeches, stiff and awkward as ever in social settings. 

“Simply marvelous,” Lady Olenna says, when Brienne is introduced to her. “How singular you are, my dear.” 

She doesn’t spare any such praise for Jaime. But he has been treated to her views on swaggering boys playing with their swords before, and has no desire to repeat the experience; he only smiles pleasantly and resolves to get through this interminable feast as quickly as possible. 

He is a Lannister of Casterly Rock. He has been part of the court at King’s Landing since his 15th year. He knows how to smile and make pleasant conversation, how to dance and play the games of the seasoned courtiers.

It doesn’t mean he has to like it.

He smiles and makes pleasant, inane conversation with Lord Mace and Lady Alerie. He speaks of horses and hounds with Willas Tyrell and of weapons and fighting with his younger brother Garlan. He manages not to say anything too cutting to Renly, or to remark on slender, exquisitely curled Loras, beautiful at his side. He pays a few pretty compliments to the doe-eyed Lady Margaery and her giggling cousins; he smiles and smiles, though no doubt they grow ever sharper as the feast drags on, and plays the part of an honoured guest. 

He keeps a discreet eye on Brienne – noting the way she blushes whenever Renly smiles at her – and steps in whenever she seems overwhelmed. 

And finally, when they make their escape, he collapses across his bed and sighs in relief. 

“Thanks the gods that’s over,” he says. 

There is a small table set out by the fireplace in his chamber, holding a bowl of peaches and fireplums, a flagon of red wine and four glasses. Brienne pours herself a small glass of wine and sits down in a carved wooden chair. “It was very beautiful,” she says. “But I never know how to…” she pauses, “it was easier at Casterly Rock, even though your father was – I mean, I was just another squire in the shadows.”

Jaime grins, and lets the comment on his father pass. He’s heard – and said – far worse. But – 

“You can’t stay in the shadows forever,” he says, “whether you like it or not. You’re the heir to the isle of Tarth, a bannerwoman to House Baratheon; at the very least you’ll have to attend court at Storm’s End.”

She only sighs. He looks over at her. Brienne is tall and strong, her shoulders broad and her hands infinitely capable. She can fight with sword and spear, axe and morningstar. She can hunt and track and forage, make camp and build fires and survive in the wild on her own resources. She can drink and swear and hold her own with other fighting men. 

All that is of no use to her now. 

“This is a place of courtiers,” he tells her. “The skills are different. The games are different.” 

She frowns. “Is there any place in the world where there are no games?”

“No,” he says simply.

**

Still, the games in the practice yard are fewer and much simpler. 

Brienne and Loras are almost of an age, but Brienne has never paid much heed to his looks, much preferring to face him in the practice yard; there, at least, he reveals his true steel. 

Jaime looks on in pleasure as they batter each other with sword and shield; two stubborn, highly competitive creatures, Loras cat-quick and with better footwork but Brienne taller, stronger and more determined. 

Knights and squires and household guards are lounging on the viewing stands, wagering on the bout. Highgarden’s master-at-arms calls out a few comments and spares a brief word of praise for Brienne. 

Eating an apple with a tiny jeweled belt-knife, Renly laughs and calls out encouragement to Loras. He’s dressed in a black velvet doublet, his half-cloak lined with gold cloth. Jaime sees Brienne’s head go up, sees her attention catch on dark, handsome Renly – 

She’s distracted for only a moment, but long enough that Loras gets in a solid blow to her ribs. Jaime winces, but feels little sympathy; if the girl wants to moon after Renly it’s her own affair. But there’s no excuse for distraction in the practice yard. 

**

**PART THREE (Brienne)**

They spend nearly a week at Highgarden. Every night the court is host to some new entertainment: a feast the first night; pleasure boating on the Mander on the second; mummers’ plays and playful romps in the rose gardens and even a masque follow in quick succession.

Brienne and Ser Jaime pay to visit a tailor to have some new clothes made up. Brienne is uncomfortable when she realizes how much it will cost, but Ser Jaime only laughs. 

“Money is nothing,” he says with the supreme unconcern of the son of the richest man in Westeros. “It’s easily won and easily lost; it can’t buy the things that truly matter.” 

**

Just before the masque, Ser Jaime shows her the steps of the courtly dances currently fashionable at Highgarden. Unlike the laughing celebrations of the village-folk and town-dwellers, the men don’t pick up the women and whirl them around breathlessly; the only contact between partners is a chaste clasp of the hand and perhaps a heated glance or two. 

“Think of it as a new sword form,” he finally advises her, after many failed attempts. “Footwork, to ensure your balance. You’ve grace enough with a sword in your hand; surely it’s not such a great leap.”

She takes his hand and allows him to guide her through the steps, feeling him signal each change of direction with his grip; it’s very much as though he’s teaching her a new form. She keeps her eyes on his and watches every shift in his body weight, responding as if they were sparring in truth. 

**

At the masque, Lord Renly dances with her and compliments her on her grace. She flushes bright red, breathless and stuttering, and can’t manage to make out the words to thank him before he bows gallantly and hands her off to another partner, who does not look nearly as pleased to be dancing with her. 

After a few hours, the night becomes unbearably warm and the festivities spill out into the gardens. The beautiful maidens and the gallant, brightly-clad knights abandon the formal ballroom and scatter into the warm, starlit night to play blind-man’s-bluff and other games amongst the roses. The sound of laughter and excited giggling drifts on the warm night air, and Brienne watches on wistfully. 

Ser Jaime comes to find her. “Well?” he asks. “Was it everything you imagined?”

She sighs. “It’s all very much like a mummer’s play,” she replies, after a while. “I don’t know how much of it is real. Are they really knights or just playing? Have they ever –” she pauses, remembering the bandits screaming in the wood. 

“Oh, some of them have been blooded,” Ser Jaime says casually. “There is strength here in the Reach, but they like to disguise it beneath fantastic costumes and play at games of love and chivalry.”

** 

The next morning in the practice yard, the men who had been so brightly clad in silks and velvets the night before now wear leather and mail. Their eyes are bloodshot and they stink of wine and perfume, but they hack at each other with sword and axe just as Brienne has seen in the practice yards of Tarth, of the Red Keep, of Casterly Rock and Crakehall. 

She knows the ways of fighting men. Ser Jaime has taught her how to win respect, if not acceptance, from them; if they mocked her at the masque, they give her the respect she deserves with sword in hand.

She tells herself that it’s enough.

**


	2. Bonus chapter - The Horse-fair

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a bonus chapter made from scenes of a sub-plot cut from "The Chivalry of Higharden". I didn't want to scrap it altogether, so here it is as a little ficlet. Please enjoy!

After they ride through the gates of Crakehall with Ser Lyle’s thanks and well-wishes, Brienne says that she wants to see the annual horse fair at Highgarden. 

“Loras says that merchants and breeders come from all over the Seven Kingdoms – even Dornishmen, with sand-steeds,” she says, patting her own mount, a solid dun gelding – strong, steady and reliable, but not a sand steed, sleek and swift-running and beautiful. 

Jaime only smiles. “Sand-steeds aren’t strong enough to carry knights in full armour.” 

“Nevertheless,” she replies. “I won prize money enough at Ashemark.”

And she wants to spend it on a sand-steed, not on whores and wine and fair-weather friends.

“Why not,” he says. 

**

Princess Elia had owned a perfect dapple-grey sand-steed, with a tail as white as Jaime’s cloak. Rhaenys had always loved to be put on its back, even if only for a turn around the stable-yard, but Elia was too fragile after Prince Aegon’s birth.

One day Elia had finally given in and asked Jaime to take Rhaenys up before him. 

The horse had been so exquisitely trained and responsive, its paces so smooth that it had felt like he and the young princess were dancing – even floating – rather than riding. 

**

The horse fair is situated on the flat plain below Highgarden and the castle town. A small city of tents has sprung up; the air is filled with the babble of a hundred different accents and the competing smells of horses and dung and trampled earth, of roasting meat and wine and beer, of exotic spices and the warm sweat and leather smell of thousands of people gathered together. Small children point and exclaim and run up to meet them, watching with curious dark eyes; women in thin, drifting silks call out bold invitations, and Brienne blushes and averts her eyes. 

They find the Dornish horse merchant and Brienne spends long moments staring at his wares, enchanted by their grace and elegance, before Jaime coughs, bringing her back to herself. By then it is too late; the merchant’s black eyes are already gleaming with calculating avarice. 

Lannisters do not _haggle_. But it’s one thing to be open-handed; it’s quite another to allow Brienne to be fleeced. As he argues over price in a crowded market like the meanest Lannisport fish-wife, Jaime spares a thought for what Tyrion would say. 

Eventually Jaime and the merchant settle on a not-too-extortionate price. Brienne hands over the majority of her tourney winnings and takes possession of a magnificent Dornish sand-steed, swift and sleek and utterly impractical in combat, and her smile is wide and bright and joyous.


End file.
